


I See My Dreams in Everything I Touch

by bigbabyjeno



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, Based On A Panic! At The Disco Song, Fluff, M/M, Witches, sort of ?, vague setting and time period
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-24
Updated: 2019-06-24
Packaged: 2020-05-14 09:16:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,241
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19270264
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bigbabyjeno/pseuds/bigbabyjeno
Summary: It shouldn’t surprise Sicheng, in a town this small, that word travels as quickly as it does.By 7:46, word has traveled as far as the school house on the far side of the village, where Sicheng is busy checking students off as they walk in. They pass him by, bowing respectfully one by one, their whispers carrying to him down the wide hallway.A witch has come to town.





	I See My Dreams in Everything I Touch

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much to the mods for coming up with and running this fest! I've loved Panic! at the Disco for so long, and the 97 line deserves so much love.
> 
> Also just: warning for a very, very vague reference to Jaehyun being hurt in the past toward the end of the fic. Blink and you’ll miss it, but I wanted to point it out just in case!

It happens, as most things are not wont to do, on a Tuesday.

It shouldn’t surprise Sicheng, in a town this small, that word travels as quickly as it does.

Here's how it goes:

At 6:18, as the sky is turning from the deep, velvety blue of night to the dove gray of early morning, not quite dawn this early in the year, a stranger passes through the village gates. They don’t get many strangers in their little hamlet, tucked into the woods as it is and nearly an hour’s drive from the nearest sizeable town.

At 7:02, the stranger is spotted walking down a path between houses in the forest, a curious bag swinging from one hand (Mary Poppins, one villager calls him), and a Y-shaped switch in the other.

By 7:46, word has traveled as far as the school house on the far side of the village, where Sicheng is busy checking students off as they walk in. They pass him by, bowing respectfully one by one, their whispers carrying to him down the wide hallway.

A witch has come to town.

✮

Sicheng first came to the little village at the tender age of seven, his mother drawn to the place by the surrounding forest and the nearby creeks, the inherent magic nature held and the offerings of the area. Her mother was a sea witch, tied to the coast and the power she drew from the water, but she was a garden witch and longed for the forest. She purchased a small cottage on the outskirts of the forest and set up shop there, became a fixture of the town with her varied charms and draughts and her curious and wonderful way with flowers and herbs.

When they first moved to the village, Sicheng went to school with the rest of the village children in the mornings, and in the evenings he helped his mother, learned the craft and how to tend to the plants, how to encourage them and help them grow. Summers were Sicheng’s favorite, because his mother let him help her all day long, even let him join her when it came time to tend to the night bloomers, staying up into the wee hours of the morning as they harvested moonflowers and violets, sage and, on occasion, wolfsbane.

He had a difficult time making friends as a child, his own interests quite different from theirs, and those who did befriend him have long since moved away. It’s not a particularly interesting town. On the contrary, it’s quite boring and Sicheng’s best friends now are his plants and his fat, fluffy calico. His cat is not great company, as she spends 90% of her time flat on her back with her paws in the air, sleeping like the dead, but he makes do.

He’s been out of school for a few years now, has debated moving to the city to attend university since he graduated, but something about the village has kept him rooted. Waiting. Though for what, he doesn't know.

✮

At 11:58 on August 18th, Sicheng lays in his bed, tossing a sachet of lavender into the air while Moonmoon the calico watches it with her beady yellow eyes. He ponders his place in this village, wonders how his mother would get on without him if he were to finally do it: gather his belongings and move to the city, apply to a university, perhaps find a local coven. Make some human friends. Choose a path to follow.

He falls asleep undecided, with the lavender cradled to his chest and Moonmoon asleep on his feet and a hazy feeling that he’s by the sea, the wind ruffling his hair heavy and damp, the distant rush of waves drawing him deeper. Sicheng dreams of a hooded figure clad in soft velvet the color of the fresh pine needles littering the forest floor. There is a strange bag in the figure’s hand and a magpie perched on their shoulder. In his dream, Sicheng listens to the needles crunching under the stranger’s feet as they pick their way through the forest, stepping over gnarled roots and fallen branches. It’s still dark out, the sky a dusky charcoal as the world holds its breath in anticipation of the rising sun. The stranger pauses at the edge of the woods, overlooking a quaint village that looks vaguely familiar. Dream Sicheng holds his breath, waiting impatiently to see what the hooded figure will do.

Suddenly, the stranger goes still, shoulders rigid, the magpie’s head cocked to the side as if they are both listening to something. Listening for something. And then, very slowly, the person turns their head. Sicheng catches a flash of pale skin, one warm brown eye looking right at him -

and then he wakes.

✮

At 6:18 in the morning on August 19th, a stranger comes to town. He wanders the fringes of the forest, switch in hand, oblivious to the whispers spreading like wildfire. It doesn’t take him long to find the well, and from there, he sets to work.

At 9:37, Sicheng is seated at the shop counter taking inventory of the fruits and flowers on display when the door chimes open. He knows who it is before he looks up, can smell lilac and lemon on the air moments before his mother’s laugh fills the small space.

“Where did you go this morning?” Sicheng asks, still peering down at his ledger. “The shop was still closed when I arrived.”

There’s lingering laughter in his mother’s voice when she says, “I found something strange in our back garden.” She slips behind the counter to press a kiss to Sicheng’s hair. “Thank you for opening for me. Now you should welcome our guest.”

Sicheng’s head snaps up, confusion already brewing at the back of his mind. He hadn’t sensed anyone else entering the shop, hadn’t even heard their footfalls. But there, standing on the other side of the counter, is a man Sicheng has never seen before.

Nevertheless, a strange sense of déjà vu strikes Sicheng, leaving him dizzy.

“Do I know you?” he asks, blunt and unapologetic.

The man blinks at him for a moment, then answers, a hint of a smile on his face, “No, I don’t believe we’ve met. I am Jaehyun.”

He reaches across the counter to offer Sicheng his hand. Sicheng eyes it warily for a moment, not sure what his reservation is. In the end, though, after a brief internal debate, he takes it. He’s been rude enough already, his mother would have his head if she hadn’t slipped off to the store room. As soon as their palms touch, warmth blooms across his skin, bleeding up his arm and curling around the back of his neck, as if Jaehyun had hugged him rather than just shake his hand. He gets a flash of something - the crunch of pine needles, a faint trickle of water, the distinct lilting call of a magpie - before he yanks his hand back as if he’s been burned. He doesn’t like the look in Jaehyun’s eyes as he cradles his hand protectively against his chest. For a brief moment, the air around them smells of the ocean, wet and salty, but it fades before Sicheng can make sense of it. 

They’re silent for a moment, staring off: Sicheng mistrustful, Jaehyun mysterious and amused.

And then, Jaehyun cuts through the tense air. “Do you mind if I look around?” he asks, gesturing behind himself to the shop. “I used up a number of my ingredients on my way here. I’m also a little hungry,” he says with a grin, patting his stomach.

Sicheng just nods, jaw tense, and watches as Jaehyun turns to slowly navigate the little shop. He studies him as he browses. There is something oddly familiar about the man, but Sicheng knows he has never seen him before, is certain he is not from this village. Sunlight streams in through the windows, glimmering in his coppery pink hair. His travel cloak is heavy, plush velvet as green as the leaves of the rosebuds he is currently caressing, sleeves billowing over his hands and hem dragging the floor.

He places odd items in his basket. A winter squash, a handful of fresh rosemary, three chrysanthemums, a peach, and a sizeable hunk of hematite. Every once in a while, he glances back at Sicheng, a curious glint in his eyes. Sicheng stares back, unashamed. He doesn’t return the man’s smiles.

 

Sicheng’s sigh of relief when Jaehyun leaves the small shop, items tucked carefully into his strange handbag, is immediate. His shoulders slump and he casts a wary glance about, feeling oddly unsettled despite the comfort of being alone once more.

Shaking it off, Sicheng goes back to his ledger, carefully adjusting the numbers to match what Jaehyun had bought. He is just finishing up when his mother slips back out into the shop, her arms laden with the items that need restocking.

“Where did Jaehyun go?” she asks, voice mild as she sets to rearranging some of the plants.

As Sicheng watches, she passes her hand over a wilting aster daisy in a pale yellow pot, coaxes the plant back to life with a soft, encouraging word. He sighs, admiring the gentle way she has, the care with which she tends to her blooms and the love she holds for each one. Then he remembers her question, and the calm vanishes, replaced by an uncomfortable tension.

“I don’t know,” he murmurs. “I didn’t ask.”

She shoots him a disappointed look that sears Sicheng right down to his toes. He hates upsetting his mother more than anything.

“Well,” she tuts, trailing a hand along the roses Jaehyun had been examining, “he can’t have gone far, it’s not like there is much to see around here. I suppose we’ll see him again soon.”

Something lodges itself in Sicheng’s throat. He’s almost afraid to ask, but he can’t help himself. “Why do you say that?”

The look his mother gives him then, head tilted to the side as she peers at him from over her shoulder, sends a ripple of awareness down Sicheng’s spine. Oh, no.

“Because,” she hums. “He’ll be staying with us for a while.”

✮

Living with Jaehyun is a test of Sicheng’s patience.

At precisely 6:05 every morning, he wakes. Sicheng knows this because their bedrooms share a wall, and he can hear the soft pad of socked feet thumping gently against the floor, the sound of running water in their shared bathroom. To Jaehyun’s credit, he does try to be as quiet as he can, and it wouldn’t be such an issue if Sicheng didn’t have this unwelcome, heightened awareness of the man. And if he wasn’t accustomed to waking at 6:30, every minute of sleep precious to him.

It is difficult to avoid him in the mornings, as they share a bathroom and a narrow hall. Sicheng of a morning is taciturn, grumpy and hyper-focused on getting ready for the day. Jaehyun, he has found, is quite the opposite. Soft, slow, and sleep-rumpled, his hands quick to steady themselves on Sicheng’s hips as they silently trade places in front of the mirror. To Sicheng’s utter irritation, he’s disarming at best and devastating at his worst, puffy-eyed and tousle-haired, his smile slow like molasses and just as syrupy sweet. It just serves to make Sicheng angrier.

It doesn’t help matters when he finds buttered toast and a peach waiting by his bag every morning, a portable breakfast offering for his walk to work with Jaehyun’s distinct signature on it, tangible and warm when he closes his hand around the soft fruit; when he comes home from his afternoon shift shelving books at the library to find Jaehyun stooped over a cauldron with his mother, hair gone frizzy from the humidity and face alight with wonder at what she’s showing him; when the odd rainy autumn day strikes and Sicheng finds Jaehyun curled up in the bay window, Moonmoon asleep on his lap as he reads or stares absently out at the forest, the dim light filtering through the glass and casting hazy shadows that dance across his pale skin.

He wants his life back, his bathroom and his privacy. His peace of mind. Sicheng has a sneaking suspicion, though he tries his best to ignore it, that he may never find that peace again.

 

“Why is Jaehyun here?” Sicheng asks his mother one day. It’s 3:43 in the afternoon and Jaehyun is back at their house working on a very long, tedious potion, a tonic for the school headmaster’s gout, that needs constant tending-to.

His mother doesn’t look up from where she’s rearranging crystals in the display case. She hums quietly to herself for a moment, then simply says, “This is where he’s meant to be.”

Frustration wells up in Sicheng’s chest and he bites out, “That’s not an answer.”

She finally looks up, eyes wide and unfathomable. It is rare that Sicheng cannot read her, but at this current moment in time, he has no idea what she’s thinking. “Do you not want him here?”

Her question throws him for a loop. Sicheng’s immediate, gut response is a resounding _no_ , but something has him pausing. Reconsidering.

Here is what it comes down to:

Warm hands on his hips, freshly buttered toast in the mornings, the soft melody of a song drifting through the crack underneath his bedroom door. Soft brown eyes watching from across the dinner table. The faint scent of vanilla and pine that lingers on the air any time Jaehyun is near. That all-too-familiar signature he leaves on everything he touches, one that tastes of peaches and tingles just beneath Sicheng’s skin.

“I don’t know,” he admits, distinctly uncomfortable with his own answer. He thinks about mentioning how something about the man feels  _ familiar _ , known, but something about the way his mother speaks of Jaehyun, looks at him when the two of them are together, makes him think perhaps she already knows. Instead, he just presses his lips together, drops his gaze to his lap.

That unreadable look on his mother’s face melts off, replaced by sympathy and understanding. She reaches a hand out to draw her fingers through his hair, the touch comforting. “Don’t worry, baby, you don’t have to have everything figured out. It will all happen, in time.”

Then she goes back to humming and rearranging, leaving Sicheng more confused than he had been before.

✮

Winter is bitingly cold in these parts of the forest. It snows early this year, sky swirling an angry gunmetal gray at a drowsy 7:04 in the morning. In anticipation of the oncoming storm, Sicheng’s mother decides not to open the shop today and so, bundled up in a blanket and slippers, Sicheng parks himself in the bay window and watches. Waits.

At 9:37, the front door to the house snicks shut, signalling someone’s departure, and Jaehyun steps into view of the window, his green cloak pulled tight around him as he lifts his face toward the sky. The first snowflakes begin to fall not moments later, drifting gently toward the ground, settling like confetti along the shoulders of Jaehyun’s cloak and dusting the ends of his hair, still that same shade of rose gold. As Sicheng watches, a bird emerges from the trees and settles on Jaehyun’s shoulder, the blue tint to its plumage visible as it ruffles its feathers to scatter errant snowflakes. Something lodges itself in Sicheng’s chest, heavy and familiar, though he can’t figure out _why_.

It’s just there, barely out of reach - a lost memory, something once known and now forgotten, and as he sits there, mind grasping for the loose tendrils of the memory, the dream, Jaehyun turns his head and meets his eye through the foggy window.

Something surges in Sicheng’s gut, hot and liquid, and he jolts back, nearly tumbles off the bench in shock. His mind goes blank when Jaehyun raises a hand, sleeve slipping back to reveal his long, elegant fingers, his slender wrist adorned with a septet of tiny, arcing stars. Jaehyun beckons to him and Sicheng shakes his head jerkily, not sure if Jaehyun can see him clearly or not.

He must be able to, because he beckons again, sleeve billowing around his arm as he waves it insistently.

“It’s cold,” Sicheng whines, knowing no one can hear him.

The last thing he wants to do is go outside in the snow, but there’s something oddly magnetic about Jaehyun like this, wrapped in green velvet, snow swirling around him and gathering around the hem of his cloak, dusting the grass and the leaves of the trees in confectioner’s sugar. Moving like an automaton, Sicheng stands, the blanket falling off his shoulders to pool around his feet. He steps out of his slippers so he can tug on a pair of boots by the door, grabs his coat, and squeezes through as narrow a crack in the door as he can manage so as not to let the heat out or the cold in.

It’s cold enough outside to steal Sicheng’s breath away, and he fights to get it back, frigid air rattling in his lungs as he trudges over to where Jaehyun stands, halfway between the house and the line of trees. The bird is nowhere to be seen. Sicheng almost wonders if he’s dreamed it up, imagined the great magpie swooping out from between the trees, but somehow, he knows he hasn’t.

When he comes to a stop beside Jaehyun, Sicheng loses his breath for an entirely different reason.

Jaehyun looks radiant like this, weak winter sunlight filtering through the heavy snow-clouds, shining off the apples of his cheeks and glinting in his eyes. There are snowflakes caught in his eyelashes.

His smile is slow and hesitant, dimples flirting to life, and Sicheng is so distracted by the sight that he startles when something touches his wrist unexpectedly. Somehow, Jaehyun’s fingers are still warm as he slides them down to clasp Sicheng’s hand in a loose grip. Heat pools underneath Sicheng’s skin, spreading from the point of contact up his arm and through his chest, warming him to his core. He stares blankly, silently, as Jaehyun lifts both of their hands and turns them palm up, so that flakes gather against their skin, brief points of fluffy white dust before they melt into tiny beads of water that fill the creases of their palms.

“Watch,” Jaehyun murmurs in Sicheng’s ear, sending a shiver rippling down his spine, and then he whispers something unintelligible into the air.

The wind picks up, blowing Sicheng’s hair about his face, but it’s oddly warm. And then, before his eyes, the snow begins to swirl. Tiny eddies form at eye-level, fat flakes dancing in the unnatural wind. He catches another whisper, feels a pulse of heat against the back of his hand, where Jaehyun is holding it gently, and then the eddies widen, encompassing them. Sicheng turns in a slow circle, as far as he can manage without letting go of Jaehyun’s hand. The snow dances around them in ribbons, twirling and crossing and catching weak winter sunlight that glitters off them like diamonds. It’s beautiful.

It must take effort, though, because Jaehyun’s palm grows steadily warmer against the back of Sicheng’s hand, until his skin is so hot he can barely stand it, and then he lets go. The swirling snow dies down, flakes fluttering back toward the ground in peaceful silence. Sicheng stares at Jaehyun’s profile, stunned.

“How did you do that?” he whispers.

Jaehyun shrugs. “I’ve always had a knack for elemental magic.” He turns to face Sicheng now, skin paler than it had been before. Sicheng has to curl his hands into fists in order to resist the urge to cup Jaehyun’s cheeks, rub some warmth into them. “It’s just magic, same as you can do.”

“I can’t do that,” Sicheng denies. “Garden magic, that’s what I can do. Plants and animals.”

“It’s all the same,” Jaehyun insists. Frowning a little, he crouches down, shakes his sleeves back and, without explanation, digs the tips of his fingers into the cold earth. As Sicheng watches, his shoulders tense and he mutters something under his breath, veins popping in what is visible of his forearms. And then -

A sprout forces its way out of the ground, impossibly green against the brittle, dying grass and the white snow. The small shoot rises, encouraged by Jaehyun’s words, and a tiny bud forms at the tip. The bud fattens in hyper-speed, sepals splitting and parting around a perfectly formed ranunculus of the palest shade of pink. Sighing, Jaehyun withdraws his hands from the ground and gently tugs the flower up out of the dirt, then hands it to Sicheng.

Sicheng takes the small flower without thinking, eyes wide on Jaehyun. He doesn’t rise, instead sits heavily on the ground and curls around his updrawn knees.

“Why are you here?” Sicheng finds himself asking. His own voice sounds faint, distant, as if it’s coming from somewhere else, whistling through the trees, disembodied.

When Jaehyun lifts his gaze to meet Sicheng’s, there is honesty written across his face, his expression open in a way it hasn’t been before. “I don’t know.”

Unsatisfied, Sicheng sinks down to sit across from him. “How did you arrive _here_? We are nowhere. This village is nothing. No one just stumbles upon us.”

Jaehyun shrugs. His hands are dirty where they clutch at the thick material of his cloak. “The water brought me here.”

“The water -”

“Months ago,” Jaehyun interrupts, his gaze distant as he stares over Sicheng’s shoulder, “I was wandering. Lost, maybe. Drifting. I didn’t -” He cuts himself off, focuses his gaze and meets Sicheng’s eyes.  “People in the city didn’t understand me.”

“You are pretty weird,” Sicheng nods, a hint of a smile at the corner of his mouth so Jaehyun knows he’s only joking. Sicheng is not quite sure how he reached this point - teasing Jaehyun about his quirks - but he finds he doesn’t mind this shift in their relationship.

“They didn’t like me. There was -”

Jaehyun’s voice falters and he drops his eyes. Sicheng finds himself reaching out for him. He takes one of Jaehyun’s hands between his own, scrubs gently at the dirt clinging to his skin. He gets a flash of something - pain, the familiar shrieks of a bird, the soothing touch of rushing water - and his hands still. He forces himself to stay silent, though, while he waits for Jaehyun to gather his thoughts again.

“When I left the city, I went to the river. I needed to cleanse my instruments after people... well. And - “ He lifts his head again, eyes oddly bright, backlit by something feverish and intense. “The water - she led me here. _Here_ , to your house.”

“That doesn’t make sense,” Sicheng insists, but he releases Jaehyun’s hand, takes the other one so he can clean it, too.

Jaehyun just shrugs and curls his fingers around Sicheng’s, stopping him. “I’m here, aren’t I?

There’s a pause, a moment suspended in time as they study each other, flakes of snow still falling silently around them. And then Sicheng’s entire body seems to sigh, relax and slump forward as he lets Jaehyun’s fingers curl around his own. “Yes,” he murmurs. “Yes you are.”

✮

Spring breaks through the bitter cold of winter with a welcome sigh, bringing with it warmth and a carpet of cherry blossoms.

Sicheng sits in his bedroom window at 5:39 in the evening on a Tuesday, tending to his ranunculus and watching as Jaehyun explains something to his mother in the garden.

Jaehyun is moving.

He’s not going far, just a few houses down to a vacant cottage, but the thought still leaves something hollow in Sicheng’s chest. He’s used to waking at 6:05 now, has come to expect his morning toast and beautifully ripened peach, the weight of eyes on him at dinner. The way people whisper as they walk together at the supermarket or stroll through the park on a Sunday. He gets it though, understands the desire for privacy, for your own place where you can feel perfectly at ease.

“That’s not it,” Jaehyun had tried to explain, eyes on Sicheng from across the table a few night earlier. “I don’t want to feel like I’m imposing anymore. I finally feel like I could belong somewhere, and I just... want it to feel permanent.”

Sicheng frowns down at the picture Jaehyun and his mother make in the garden, heads bent together over a plot of herbs, hands poking about in the dirt. He rests his chin in his palm, ranunculus forgotten, and thinks about that word. _Permanent_. Thinks about Jaehyun and belonging and warm hands on his hips and fingers twined with his own and the spark of warmth under his skin and the glimmer of winter sunlight on pale skin, and before he knows it, he leaning halfway out the window and calling down to them.

“Jung Jaehyun!”

It takes a moment, his voice nearly lost on the wind, but when Jaehyun turns to peer up at him, Sicheng’s breath catches in his throat. He looks a picture, hair glinting copper in the setting sun, sweater stretching tight across his broad back, sleeves rolled up over lightly muscled forearms. His lips curve up into a smile, syrupy slow, dimples etched deep into his cheeks, and Sicheng’s heart lurches in his chest.

Jaehyun waves, oblivious to Sicheng’s turmoil, garden shears clutched in his hand, and Sicheng sighs. He cups his hands around his mouth and calls down, “Can you come up here for a minute?”

A brief flash of confusion flits across Jaehyun’s face, but he turns to murmur something to Sicheng’s mother, then sets the shears down and heads toward the front of the house. It only takes a few minutes for him to reach Sicheng’s bedroom door, but it’s enough time for Sicheng to panic. He has no idea why he did that, why he’s called Jaehyun up here. He has nothing concrete to say to him, only this tangled mess of emotions swirling violently in his chest, and he doesn’t even know what they _mean_ yet.

A knock sounds on his door and Sicheng glances at the clock.

5:53.

Pressing his lips together, Sicheng strides across the room to open the door.

“Is everything okay?” Jaehyun asks immediately, reaching a hand out to run it down Sicheng’s arm, as if looking for wounds. Sicheng has no idea why he would do something like that, but he doesn’t push him off. It feels nice, warmth trailing down Sicheng’s skin in his wake.

“Yes, I -” He pauses, frowns. Tilts his head to the side. “Is that my sweater?”

“What? Oh.” Jaehyun looks down at himself, hands tugging at the hem of the sweater. He smiles at Sicheng, a bit sheepish, as he raises his head again. “Yes it is. I’m sorry, I should have asked. It just looked really warm, and you were gone on your visit to the city, and it... smelled like you...” he trails off, voice growing weak.

He looks embarrassed now, cheeks flushed pink as he stares down at the floor, but something warm blooms in Sicheng’s chest. “I want to move with you,” he blurts out, not even aware that that was the direction his thoughts had been taking.

Jaehyun’s head snaps up, his eyes wide as he stares at Sicheng, mouth hanging open. “You - what?”

“I mean,” Sicheng falters, suddenly unsure, “if you want. I know you probably want your privacy, but I -”

“No,” Jaehyun interrupts. Sicheng’s face falls, heart plummeting to his feet. Jaehyun must sense his distress, because he steps forward, crossing the threshold so he can grasp at Sicheng’s elbows. “Oh, Sicheng, that’s not what I mean. I meant no, I don’t need privacy.” He makes a face, corrects, “Well yes, I do, but not like... alone privacy. Wait, what about your mom?”

Sicheng shrugs, craning his head back to peer out the window, as if he could see his mother from this vantage point. He thinks back to her strange responses to his questions about Jaehyun all those months ago, remembers _this is where he’s meant to be_. Goosebumps spread across his arms and he shakes his head, a small smile tucked into the corners of his mouth. “Something tells me she’s been expecting this for a while.”

Jaehyun’s fingers flex against Sicheng’s arms, like he’s not sure if he should continue holding on or if he should let go. Sicheng hopes he doesn’t let go. Jaehyun’s voice is hesitant when he asks, “Why do you want to move in with me, Sicheng? I’m not saying no, I just need to know.”

Sicheng’s brow furrows as he thinks about all of the reasons he could list. Things he’s grown to expect, with Jaehyun around, things he’s grown to like about having him there, things he’s grown to love. He’s not good at using his words.

So instead, Sicheng settles his hands carefully on Jaehyun’s hips, the fabric of his sweater ( _his_ sweater) soft underneath his palms, and leans in, presses his lips gently to Jaehyun’s.

For the briefest moment, the world stops spinning on its axis as warmth floods him, seeping into every nook and cranny of Sicheng’s body. Jaehyun’s chest rumbles against his own, his lips part beneath Sicheng’s on a soft moan, and then Sicheng sees it, feels it, just like he had when they first met all those months ago, he remembers now  \- a body bent over a river, blood-stained hands submerged as a soft, familiar voice chants under his breath; the crunch of pine needles under-foot as he walks, green cloak dragging across the forest floor; the twitch of a divining rod in hand; the comforting chirp of a magpie; the burst of relief upon sighting a row of tidy stone cottages nestled in the trees. The trickle of awareness as he felt someone watching him, the way he slowly turned his head away from the little houses to meet someone’s eye -

Sicheng breaks away with a gasp. He tastes salt on his mouth, and the air floating in from the open window smells disconcertingly of the sea, though Sicheng barely registers anything past the foggy haze of dreams resurfacing. “I dreamed of you.” At Jaehyun’s inquisitive look, Sicheng pauses, frowns. “This is going to sound mad.”

“You can’t help that, we’re all mad here,” Jaehyun recites with a grin, and Sicheng groans.

“I’ve changed my mind, I don’t want to move in with you.”

“No,” Jaehyun croons, laughing quietly. “I liked your reason.”

Sicheng turns his face away, cheeks flushed pink with pleasure, then peeks back at Jaehyun from beneath his lashes. “Does that mean you’ll say yes?”

Jaehyun hesitates, expression flickering for the briefest of moments. “Are you sure?”

“I don’t say things I don’t mean.”

Something soft, hopeful flits across Jaehyun’s face, but he squeezes at Sicheng’s elbows, whispers, “People will talk.”

Sicheng rolls his eyes and pulls Jaehyun closer, lifts up onto his toes so he can brush their lips together. Relishes in the shiver he gets out of Jaehyun when he drags his teeth slowly across his bottom lip. He tastes like peaches.

“They already do.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading, I hope you enjoyed! ❤️
> 
> I am on [twitter](https://twitter.com/idkmybffwangji) and [curiouscat](https://curiouscat.me/bigbabyjeno), if you want to say hi!


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